Alice in Solarland

People talk
about living off the grid but do you know anyone who actually does?

Alice
Fleetwood, one of Ergon Energy’s vacation employment students, knows all about
it.

The third
year electrical engineering student from Griffith University is one of 15
students who’ve gained real industry experience with Ergon over the past 12
weeks.

She brought
a real love and understanding of renewable energy to her vacation placement
because Alice’s up-bringing was all about living sustainably.

“That’s how
I grew up,” Alice said.

“We lived on
a 15 acre property in Northern New South Wales and we were completely off grid.

“All we had
was a 2 kilowatt solar PV set up so there was no microwave and very little time
for TV and computers.

“My brother,
sister and I didn’t know any other way.

“It was just
part of daily-life.

“We lived
simply and learnt very early, the importance of conserving and just because we
lived simply didn’t mean we lived tough.”

And that’s
where Alice’s interest in the relationship between renewables and electrical
engineering was born.

Having
parents with science backgrounds and a love of sustainability helped develop a
real understanding of the need to find a balance between traditional power
generation and the growing field of renewable energy.

“Initially
my interest was in renewable energy but now that I’ve learnt about conventional
grid network, I’m now interested in looking at how renewables work in with that.”

During the
vacation placement students were given a task.

Come up with
an innovation idea, something limited only by their imagination.

Alice’s
concept was judged the winner out of a very strong field of contenders.

Her concept
was as simple as it is innovative.

With
Australia, and in particular Queensland, leading the world in the up-take of
solar PV, Alice found her inspiration on hundreds of thousands of roof tops.

The plan - convince
solar PV owners to spread the generating capacity of their solar panels across
a larger area of roof space and in opposing directions to ensure the midday
solar peak wasn’t so pronounced for Ergon Energy and its network.

“My idea
called ‘East to West is best’ was really about raising awareness about how best
to set-up solar.

“Traditionally
the installation of solar PV has meant setting the system up to get the most of
the sunlight at its peak.

“I have
posed the question, is the conventional idea necessarily the solution?

“If we can
spread the power being fed back into the network through the day, then some of
the problems caused by voltage rise on the network can be eased.”

Problems
occur when an area has too many customers wanting to feed solar energy back
into the grid, a grid that was originally constructed to send power in just one
direction.

If the feed
in to the grid becomes too much, then expensive upgrades to the local network
are required, sometimes costing hundreds of thousands of dollars.

Similar
proposals have been trialed in parts of North America, the UK and Europe where
energy providers have been looking for ways to avoid strain on the grid.

Another
benefit of the proposal, it gives solar customers the chance to increase their
solar panel capacity without having to upgrade the inverter.

“It’s about
educating the solar industry to change the way it thinks and that sort of thing
would require a marketing campaign and further promotion.”

Alice’s time
at Ergon has been an eye opener which has given her plenty of knowledge to take
back to Brisbane for the academic year.

“It’s been
absolutely amazing and I’ve been so lucky working with such a wonderful team of
experts in Cairns.

“It’s nice
to get recognition, but the biggest thing for me has been how much I’ve learnt
seeing how Ergon Energy is embracing renewable energy.”